Friday, October 29, 2004

You probably aren’t waiting for my prediction. And until today, I haven’t had one for about a month. But…

Bush will win. Why I’m I suddenly predicting this after weeks of pre-election anxiety? One word…

Osama.

Osama just couldn’t stick to what he knows best (killing innocent people, of course). He just had to inject himself into our election with his home videos.

I don’t think his effort will sit well with undecided or barely decided voters. We’re not Spain. You try to kick U.S. around, we kick back. AND if you are a hostile foreigner, much less a terrorist, and you try to tell us how to vote . . .

Well, Bush will win. Furthermore, it will be clear he’s winning before 9 Eastern Time Tuesday night.

Undecideds often cut for the challenger. And they might have done so for Kerry. But not now. And with polls already showing Bush narrowly ahead before Osama’s home videos, I can’t see how Kerry can win this one now.

Thursday, October 28, 2004

I am woman; watch me roar . . . and worship pagan deities and . . .

If you been wondering around the conservative Anglican blogdom this week, you are surely aware of the *ahem* controversy surrounding “A Women’s Eucharist: A Celebration of the Divine Feminine,” which is little more than rank feminist paganism. This so-called eucharist is put forth by Episcopal priestess The Rev. Glyn Lorraine Ruppe Melnyk, who happens to double as a Druid.

I’ve seen this all before. Remember the Reimagining conference in my good ol’ Presbyterian Church years back? Remember them worshipping “Sophia”? That created quite the prolonged controversy in the Presbyterian Church, really turning up the heat on divisions in that denomination in the 90’s – heck, into this decade as well.

It will be interesting to see what the fallout will be from this Episcopal version of pagan worship.

I have something to confess: I get a good laugh out of this. If that’s a sin, forgive me. But do those feminists realize how silly they look?

I’ve been involved in politics for not a few years. And I’ve seen this before – an unscrupulous candidate throws a false charge out there right before the election so his opponent has difficulty setting the record straight. Now most candidates have more class and ethics than that.

I am so sorry that you’re offended since you’re not as enlightened as me.

The Windsor Report asks expressions of regret from those bishops who pushed gay bishops and same-sex blessings upon us. Well *ahem* some of those “regrets” have come in. You may have noticed that they are the sort of unapologetic expressions of regret that would have prompted our mamas to send us back to sit in the corner.

They scarcely live up even to the Windsor Report’s requests. And the Windsor Report certainly doesn’t request much of the wayward bishops.

But Captain Yips makes the intriguing point that the report’s modest requests of the naughty bishops set a trap for them. And Griswold and Ingham and company are already falling into the trap by refusing to meet even those modest requests. The trap?

At the Primates meeting in February, ECUSA’s critics will be able to say, “We didn’t ask much of them, but they didn’t even try.”

Indeed, not much is being asked of them. The Pontificator may be right in denouncing that. Yet Captain Yips may be right, too. Could it be that the best way to expose just how stiff-necked and divisive the liberal North American bishops are and how deserving they are of a swift kick out of the Anglican Communion may indeed be to not ask much of them?

Tuesday, October 26, 2004

The news media campaign continues.

I saw the headlines this morning about all the tons of missing weapons in Iraq. The front page stories made it sound like this was actually news as in new. And I bought it and thought, crap, how could the military be so negligent.

But it turns out it’s not real news after all. These weapons went missing soon after and perhaps before our invasion of Iraq. (Even CBS News acknowledges this.) I fail to see what’s newsworthy about that, much less front page newsworthy. The enemy tried to keep their weapons from us and occasionally succeeded. Wow, that’s news.

Of course, this “story” comes out the last week of the campaign, and Kerry jumps all over it.

News that the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court has thyroid cancer brings closer to home what I consider the most important issue in this election – the composition of the Supreme Court.

Today, the Court is closely divided between those who put themselves under the U. S. Constitution and seek to interpret and apply it and those who put themselves over the Constitution and mangle or just ignore it to impose their own views. In other words, we are perilously close to becoming a dictatorship of the Supreme Court. With two or more Court vacancies very possible the next four years, whoever is president may have the power to pull us back from or plunge us into judicial dictatorship.

President Bush in both his campaigns has pledged to appoint Supreme Court justices who strive to stick to the Constitution. We need to hold him accountable to that promise, but his appellate appointments indicate he’ll keep his word.

John Kerry has made clear he would apply liberal litmus tests to his appointments, such as upholding the infamous Roe v. Wade decision which legalized abortion on demand. A restrained interpretation of the Constitution is definitely not among those tests. And, being the Massachusetts liberal he is, he will surely appoint justices who put their own liberal views over the Constitution.

Now I can almost hear the liberals cry, “It’s not about the authority of the Constitution, it’s about interpretation!” No, it’s not. Some of the opinions of the four (five?) liberal justices of the Court are so divorced from the Constitution, it’s absurd. They have even been citing foreign courts in their rulings. It reminds me of those religious liberal leaders who claim to hold to the authority of scripture, then willfully go against what it teaches again and again.

The U. S. Senate races are important, too. Most Democrat Senators have blocked key appointments of judges committed to sticking to the Constitution. These senators care more about having their liberal views imposed by judges than they do about the Constitution. They, especially ringleader Tom Daschle of South Dakota, must be defeated. We must instead elect Senators who will confirm only Constitutionalist Supreme Court appointments.

There have been so many wild claims about this election, I hate to even appear to add to them. But this election goes to the very heart of who we are as nation. For whoever is elected may well have the power to give us a Supreme Court which respects and upholds our Constitution and keeps us a Constitutional republic or a Supreme Court which puts the Constitution aside and imposes a Dictatorship of the Black Robes.

Sunday, October 24, 2004

The Windsor Report: The Newbie speaks!

Yes, I’ve finally managed to read all the Windsor Report (except for most of the appendices). And I have very mixed feelings.

My biggest problem remains its opposition to bishops intervening on behalf of orthodox parishes under apostate bishops. I’ll probably deal with that separately later. But the report is so weak in providing a place for besieged orthodox that my gut response to the following . . .

In some instances, this breach of trust has been felt so keenly that a parish or diocese has found itself unwilling to accept the ministry of a bishop associated with such contrary action, and has invited bishops from elsewhere in the province or beyond to provide pastoral and sacramental oversight. In some cases, there are primates and bishops who have acceded to these requests with or without reference to the proper authorities of the diocese concerned. We want to make quite clear that we fully understand the principled concerns that have led to those actions . . .

. . . was to say, “No, you don’t.”

Again, I’ll probably say more about that.

A number of orthodox are pleased that the report affirms the authority of scripture. But I’ve seen no one yet publicly take note of the very next paragraph (para. 54), which has loopholes big enough to drive a cathedral through. The sentence that especially rings alarm bells for me is:

Thus the phrase “the authority of scripture”, if it is to be based on what scripture itself says, must be regarded as a shorthand, and a potentially misleading one at that, for the longer and more complex notion of “the authority of the triune God, exercised through scripture”.

That reminds me of the woman whom I heard say from a Presbyterian pulpit, “We don’t believe the Bible; we believe the Christ behind the Bible.” Such statements are an open invitation to pick and chose what parts of scripture to keep or toss depending on subjective opinions on which ones have God behind them or not. Such “authority of scripture” in reality puts man, not God, in authority over scripture.

I may sound paranoid, but I’ve seen all this before. Those who are taking comfort from the report’s supposed affirmation of scripture are in for a big disappointment I’m afraid.

Another problem: the report advocates lots and lots of dialogue, but has no time tables. I’m a newbie Anglican, but I’ve already caught on that ++Griswold and such love to wear down their opposition with endless “dialogue.” The Robinson consecration is a classic example of “We’ll do what we want, then we’ll try to talk with you about it until you give up.” The report encourages more of the same.

A more fundamental problem occurs earlier in paragraph 45. And maybe this cranky fundie is making too much of Anglican niceties. But there it is assumed that Anglicans have “shared status as children of God in Christ.”

No they don’t.

There are wolves in sheep’s clothing in the Anglican Communion – a lot of them. And a number of them wear pointy hats, too. A fundamental error of the report -- perhaps the most fundamental error – is the report glosses over that and acts as if we’re all just God’s children here having tea. Instead, as Jesus would say, there are a lot of children of the devil among us. And we let a lot of them become bishops. That’s really why we’re having these problems in the first place.

I know -- now that I’m Anglican, I should learn to be nice and drink tea and sherry (I WON’T learn to smoke.) instead of saying such things. But the church must protect itself from wolves, from heretics and apostates who deceive and usurp authority. Two whole letters of the Bible (2 John and Jude) and more emphasize the needfulness of setting aside false teachers. In its eagerness to keep all of us “children of God” in communion, the report almost completely misses that necessity.

Note that I say “almost.” That leads to the main strengths of the Windsor Report. It does lay down requirements for those who have pushed actively gay bishops and same-sex blessings if they are to remain in communion. It does so rather weakly in a number of ways, but it does so nonetheless.

And it proposes a covenant to be required of the Anglican Communion. Now the problem with that is that wolves like to define nice religious words however they please. But it’s still a good proposal in the right direction.

Especially if the Primates ditch the weak and errant sections and strengthen the requirements for communion (And there are already some noises that some Primates will attempt just that.), the Windsor Report has tools the Primates can use to somewhat clean up this mess.

Saturday, October 23, 2004

Certain people will say anything.

Let’s see if I get this straight. John Kerry engages in that old Democrat tactic of trying to scare the elderly on social security. He tries to scare the young, too, by darkly insinuating that Bush will bring back the draft, even though the President has repeatedly said he opposes the draft and even though the House of Representatives voted down a Democrat bill to bring back the draft by a ridiculous margin.

But when the Bush campaign rightly points out that Kerry has a long, long record of being weak on defense and weak on intelligence, Kerry calls it . . . “fearmongering.”

Wednesday, October 20, 2004

I’m glad to see he doesn’t much appreciate the report’s suggestions that intervening Primates and bishops desist and apologize. Those parts of the report are the ones I find most disturbing at this time myself.

I’ve noticed that people whose opinions I respect, such as the archbishop, David Roseberry, Kendall Harmon, and my rector for that matter, have different views on the report. I still haven’t been able to read the whole report and so am reserving my opinion on the report as a whole.

Monday, October 18, 2004

Over at the Ship of Fools, someone posted a wonderfully succinct summary of the Windsor Report:

"You've all been very naughty children. Now stop it at once."

I replied as follows:

“Very good summary!

“The problem is if the ‘children’ have no reason to believe they will be disciplined if they continue their misbehavior (And I don't think the Windsor Report gives the ECUSA et al any such reason.), then do you think the children will suddenly behave?”

Indeed, the approach the Windsor Report takes toward discipline is markedly weaker than the two approaches I laid out yesterday. I really have a hard time seeing how such a lack of clear discipline can work with either children or wayward bishops.

I haven’t read the whole Windsor Report yet. So I’m trying to withhold judgment on the report.

But the section on “care of dissenting groups” is a big disappointment. While praising the inadequate DEPO plan from the ECUSA House of Bishops, it calls on intervening bishops and primates to apologize and intervene no more!

I’ve read this section completely and carefully more than twice. And it completely fails to make adequate provision for dissenting orthodox parishes. Like the DEPO plan it praises, there are no requirements or sanctions proposed for bishops reluctant to allow adequate oversight, just suggestions. Therefore dissenting parishes would remain at their mercy.

Furthermore, since the section opposes parallel jurisdictions, it denies the pleas of those who wish to remain in the Anglican Communion, but not in the ECUSA.

Maybe I’m missing something. I’m admittedly rather new at reading Anglicanesse. But for these reasons, I can’t see how the Windsor Report can be anything but a failure.

Sunday, October 17, 2004

If you make the mistake of letting a child get away with everything, and you see that’s got to stop, what do you do?

1. Immediately, without warning, change policy and crack down on the kid? That probably teaches him more about your unfairness than about his behavior.

2. Sit him down and clearly give him a warning, explaining to him that his behavior is unacceptable and will be punished if repeated. Then if (when) he then chooses to repeat his behavior, you keep your word and punish him.

I think #2 is just common sense. Similarly, as many problems as I have with the Episcopal Church, after reflection I now do not think it should be immediately expelled or suspended. I know some of my orthodox friends think it should be and are upset that now it looks like that won’t happen.

But for years, the ECUSA has gotten away with everything. And conservative Anglicans worldwide share the blame for that. The right way to deal with this is not method #1, but method #2. A part of the genius of #2 (and the Windsor Report if leaks are accurate) is that then the ECUSA chooses to abide by the rules and avoid punishment or not.

Of course, saying that begs the question of just what are the rules. And it would be jumping the gun for me to speak to that.

Saturday, October 16, 2004

The truth about liberals comes out.

Canon David Roseberry and Episcoliberal Katie Sherrod have an enlightening debate on gay bishops in this morning’s Dallas Morning News, in the Religion section. (The site is Dallasnews.com if you want to deal with registration.)

In her piece, Sherrod makes a revealing comment: “We have learned that scripture sometimes is simply wrong.”

Oh, have “we”? Well, it’s so nice to know we’ve become so enlightened.

She then proceeds to lampoon scripture: “The world is not flat, epilepsy is not caused by possession and being left-handed doesn’t mean you are demonic.” Like the Bible teaches any of those things. But we’ll pretend it does so we can feel superior.

But, wait a second. I’ve heard upteen liberals insist that they respect the authority of scripture, that the issue is differing “interpretation.” Does Ms. Sherrod admit that the issue really is the authority of scripture and one’s attitude towards it? Do liberals indeed insist on having the final authority to trash scripture they don’t like?

Well, there’s leaks all over the place on the Windsor Report to be released Monday. I honestly don’t know what to think about it yet. But there’s vigorous discussion here and here and elsewhere I’m sure.

Monday will probably be a busy day for me, but I’ll try to comment Monday night or once I have my thoughts and time together.

One thing I’ve noticed in the discussions -- some Anglican conservatives are “glass half-empty” kind of people. After all they’ve gone through the past 30 years, I can’t say that I blame them.

Friday, October 15, 2004

Typical Liberal Hypocrisy from Kerry

I’ve long noticed that liberals have no problem with imposing their views on others. And religious liberals are the worst of all about that, shoving their views down the throats of even their fellow religionists. Yes, being the shovee for years helped drive me out of the mainline Presbyterian Church.

But if a conservative dares to be guided by his faith in his public policy views, why that’s AWFUL!! That’s, that’s a violation of (Bow down!) SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE!! (Wailing and knashing of teeth.)

I have to stop for a second because I’m hyperventilating a bit here. This comes from a man who supports partial-birth abortion and votes 100% pro-abortion or close to it. Kerry, as always, is trying to have it both ways. He votes again and again to declare open season on even late-term babies to the point of brutal infanticide, but at the same time campaigns as St. Kerry who reveres the life of the unborn. This man makes me want to vomit.

There, I feel better.

BUT does he have any problem imposing his oh-so-enlightened religious views in a liberal direction? Of course not! And he said as much in the same debate!

I’ve been slow to comment on this because I didn’t want to rely too much on the initial Guardian article. Heck, I don’t EVER want to rely too much on the Guardian. But seeing that I give liberals a hard time here, I need to give equal time. . . .

Dean Philip Jensen’s remarks to Reform were way out of line. I have gotten annoyed at the Archbishop of Canterbury, but to even imply that he’s some sort of prostitute is just wrong. The man has demonstrated thoughtfulness and tries his best to be fair to all parties. I’ve strongly disagreed with him at times, but he deserves at least a minimum of respect.

As for implying that King’s College is “a temple to paganism,” thems are fighting words. I love the music of King’s College. It glorifies God and helps many worship, including me. I thank God for King’s College.

And the laborer is worthy of his wages, so I have no problem with the college selling cds to visitors. Heck, I’ll probably buy some of those cds someday.

The Confessing Evangelical made a very thoughtful post on Christians’ attitudes towards gays and singles a few days ago.

I feel strongly that the church needs to maintain a traditional Biblical view of sexual conduct. At the same time, the church needs to watch its attitudes towards gays and toward singles in general.

I say that because I’ve seen conservative views on sex and family morph themselves into hateful attitudes toward gays and negative views on singles as well. As I’ve mentioned here before, I’ve had my singleness found at fault at a previous church years ago. I’m careful enough about this now that I asked the rector at Providence Church polite but point-blank questions to gauge his attitudes toward singleness before I joined.

I’m more careful about my attitudes towards gays than I was years ago. With Confessing Evangelical, I urge my fellow conservative Christians to join me in that – and to watch their attitudes towards singles in general.

Tuesday, October 12, 2004

I had some very good, but very different worship music experiences this weekend in Dallas. Among other things, I discovered the David Crowder Band and St. Matthew’s Cathedral.

DCB was the worship band for the Youth Specialties convention I attended. They ROCK with excellent edgy guitars, but they also really helped me worship. David Crowder himself is a sight to see. He’s this skinny guy who is all teeth and glasses and frizzy hair. And he talks in this fast, nervous mumble. He’s great!

Sunday morning, though, I wasn’t real interested in the convention program. But I did want to check out the choral eucharist at St. Matthew’s, Bishop Stanton’s church. He wasn’t there, which is o.k. Dean Michael Mills gave an excellent sermon. He has a unique preaching style and very straightforward way of getting the message across which grew on me.

Most of the sanctuary is quite old and, well, kinda Catholicky – which I liked. There were lots of candles. Most of the stained glass was beautiful with much of it (the green tinted glass) over 100 years old. The stations of the cross were portrayed in stained glass. And there were at least two crucifixes on the wall. The main altar along with the choir is elevated above the congregation.

On the left side I noticed an altar with a picture and statue of Mary. And there was a Marian shrine with candles beside that. I don’t think +Stanton is Anglo-Cath. So I’m curious about that. Both the Mary altar and the main altar were used for Communion.

Those who have stereotyped views of conservatives will be surprised to hear that the congregation was quite multi-cultural. And women played a prominent role in the worship (which made me a little nervous at times, but I’ll discuss that issue some other time.).

Oh yeah, the music. Ooooh, the music! The choir, though not huge, was excellent. And the organist was great, playing with the sort of power I like in a church organ. Sometimes, I had to close my eyes and let the music wash over me. At the same time, the congregational parts were very easy to sing. Heck, I think even I sounded good.

Anyway, very different worship music experiences. But I liked them both. And both helped me worship.

Thursday, October 07, 2004

I visited my dermatologist yesterday because there was a spot on my scalp I found very suspicious. He took one look at it and said it was harmless, thank God.

But then we talked about other skin-related matters, and I brought up my small, few, but persistent, hand warts.

He said, "Well, there's been a new development in the treatment of warts since you last visited. And it involves duct tape." And he proceeded to tell me that studies have shown that covering warts in duct tape for two months eliminates them about 80% of the time.

No, he wasn't kidding. We had a good laugh over that, though.

I've heard about duct tape fixing just about everything, but this is ridiculous!

The Rt. Rev. Ray Sutton, who confirmed me, is a bishop who takes his teaching role seriously. And he showed it during his visitation to my new church Providence REC. He gave a mini-seminar on the current state of the Anglican Communion and the Reformed Episcopal Church on Saturday the 25th. And he taught Sunday School and gave the sermon on Sunday the 26th.

Much of what he taught is already known to the average reader of this blog. So Iâ€™ll stick to highlights and interesting tidbits.

He stated that the struggles between conservatives and revisionists in the Episcopal Church USA are nothing new. Back at its founding after the Revolutionary War, Latitudinarianism was popular. It advocated subscribing only to the Bible while ditching the creeds. Bishop William White was very much influenced by it and got the Athanasian Creed taken out of the U.S. prayer book and tried to get the Nicene Creed taken out.

Fortunately, Bishop Samuel Seabury, with the support and urging of the Scottish bishops who consecrated him, successfully insisted on keeping the Nicene Creed. In fact, you might say the Scottish bishops did an intervention, consecrating Seabury in order to thwart Latitudinarianism in the U. S.

The Reformed Episcopal Church, shortly after its founding, added back the Athanasian Creed as well, the first U.S. Anglican church to do so. (The ECUSA didnâ€™t add it back to its prayer books until 1979, and then in the Historical Documents section in the back.)

Now that Iâ€™m a confirmed member of Providence Reformed Episcopal Church and have revealed the identity of that â€œSmall Continuing Anglican Church,â€� I will show restraint in telling of my experiences there. I donâ€™t think it would be appropriate to tell of everything I see there any more than it would be appropriate for you to broadcast everything that goes on in your family.

No one has expressed concern about this. But I thought it best to go ahead and let readers know.

Also, I will be at the National Youth Workers Convention in Dallas Friday into Monday. So I probably won't be posting much then.

If any readers will be at that convention, I'd love to meet you. Give me a shout! Or look for a black "God Knows What It's Like to be a Teenager" t-shirt. That will probably be me shamelessly promoting my book.

My confirmation begs the question: Am I still a wannabe Anglican? Or am I the real thing now?

Different people would have different answers. I know some would not consider me Anglican until Iâ€™m in communion with the Archbishop of Canterbury. And that hasnâ€™t happened, although itâ€™s not out of the realm of possibility. Others might find my Anglicanism suspect because I donâ€™t smoke and drink sherry.

I do consider myself Anglican now, however. I believe the creeds and over 95% of the 39 Articles. Iâ€™m in agreement with and even love Anglican worship and practice. And now I have joined a Continuing Anglican church. Iâ€™ve even made the point of being confirmed by a bishop in the apostolic succession (as Reformed Episcopal bishops are) even though the polity of the church I joined did not at all require that. (A transfer of membership suffices in the REC.)

In some ways, Iâ€™m still a wannabe Anglican, though. I want to be part of the Anglican Communion, or at least a worldwide orthodox Anglican communion much larger than the Reformed Episcopal Church (And so do REC leaders I suspect.). Being a part of something larger than just my local or national church is one desire that lead me to Anglicanism.

Taken altogether, itâ€™s probably most accurate to say Iâ€™m a Newbie Anglican.

But I donâ€™t want to change the web site address. I might play games with the blog title though.

Monday, October 04, 2004

The long and awful years of Peter Carnleyâ€™s Primacy over the Anglican Church of Australia are finally coming to an end. And not a moment too soon.

Iâ€™ve taken him to task here before and could have easily done so many times. For he has the wonderful ability to say something stupid and/or offensive to conservatives every time he opens his mouth.

And heâ€™s ending his time as Primate that way as well. He uses his opening address at the General Synod over the weekend to take potshots at Prime Minister John Howard in the midst of an election campaign.

As one poster, Gayle, on the linked thread mentioned, the irony of this is as rich as its stupidity. For activist homosexuals and decadent Western society have so sexualized everything, that itâ€™s difficult to have close non-sexual friendships anymore. I myself have guy friends I would like to be closer to, but Iâ€™m at the same time afraid to be closer for fear it would be misinterpreted.

In any case, ++Carnley is going out in style. The only downside to his leaving is that there isnâ€™t much hope that his successor will be much better.

Sunday, October 03, 2004

I went to St. David's in Denton this morning. The liturgy was excellent as usual. I've mentioned before that the rector has a passion for history and good liturgy.

They rang a bell 6 or so times during the service. They are bell-ringing Anglicans there.

Afterwards, I told the rector I got confirmed in the Reformed Episcopal Church (St. David's is ECUSA . . . barely.). And I let him know his parish played a role in my Anglican pilgrimage. We talked a bit. He knows Bishop Ray Sutton (the bishop who confirmed me). The Right Reverend Ray gets around.

Saturday, October 02, 2004

Itâ€™s been a long time.

Speaking of waiting for the Lambeth Commission, it seems a long time ago, at least to me, since this all started in the Summer of 2003. But this is now October 2004, and weâ€™ll soon hear from the commission.

I have been pretty persistent in praying for the Anglican Communion. I urge you all to continue to be persistent as well. As the 1928 collect for this past week prays:

O Lord, we beseech tee, let thy continual pity cleanse and defend thy Church; and, because it can not continue in safety without thy succour, preserve it evermore by they help and goodness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Friday, October 01, 2004

The timeliness of Bible readings (and collects)

Iâ€™ve always been one to believe in Godâ€™s timing in bringing His word to us. Like my very recent pastor Tommy Nelson has said, God knows what youâ€™re going through, and He knows where youâ€™re going to read in His word. And He can bring the two together to speak straight to you.

I found that again to be the case during my Confirmation Sunday. The Epistle Lesson from Ephesians 3: 13-21 has long been a favorite prayer of mine. And its prayer for strengthening by the Holy Spirit is very appropriate for a confirmation.

Iâ€™m beginning to wonder if God uses collects that way as well. The 1928 and REC collects lately (which are the same) seem to focus on asking God to preserve and guide His church â€“ very appropriate as the Anglican Communion waits for the Lambeth Commission report to come out.